1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a foam filling member for forming foam to be filled in a space of a structure.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is generally known that foam is filled in a hollow structure, such as a pillar of a vehicle, for the purpose of ensuring vibration suppression and sound insulation. A foam filling member is used for forming such foam. In use, the foam filling member is placed in an interior space of the hollow structure to be filled and is foamed by the application of heat from outside to form the foam, so that the interior space is filled with the foam thus formed.
For example JP Laid-open (Unexamined) Patent Publication No. 2003-63443 proposes a hollow panel foam filling method wherein an unfoamed solid foam filling member is placed in an interior filling area of the hollow panel and then is foamed by the application of heat from outside, whereby the foam resulting from the foam formation is filled in the interior filling area. In this document, the foam filling member is in the form of a sheet-like base foam material which is elastically deformable into a rolled shape. The sheet-like base foam material is placed in the interior filling area in the rolled state, so that it is held in the interior filling area by the resilience resulting from the elastic deformation of the rolled base foam material and, then, the as-rolled sheet-like base foam material is foamed by the application of heat, whereby the foam resulting from the foam formation of the base foam material is filled in the interior filling area.
However, this foam filling method described in JP Laid-open (Unexamined) Patent Publication No. 2003-63443 has the disadvantage that since the sheet-like base foam material rolled is held in the interior filling area by the resilience resulting from the elastic deformation of the rolled base foam material, the sheet-like base foam material is not stably kept in the rolled state due to its possible displacement and, resultantly, it cannot be filled in the interior filling area of the hollow panel reliably.
On the other hand, when the sheet-like base foam material is held by a clip and the like for the purpose of keeping the sheet-like base foam material in the rolled state stably, there is provided another disadvantage that the number of components is increased and also there is provided the additional disadvantage that since the clip is buried in the foam, the effects of the foam of vibration suppression and sound insulation are reduced.
Also, some hollow structures, such as, for example, pillars of automobiles, have two inner spaces (e.g. a space between a side frame outer and a center pillar reinforce and a space between the center pillar reinforce and a center pillar inner) to be filled with their respective foams, as disclosed in JP Laid-open (Unexamined) Patent Publication No. Hei 11-99960.
The structure described by JP Laid-open (Unexamined) Patent Publication No. Hei 11-99960 requires that after the foam filling material is set in the space between the side frame outer and the center pillar reinforce, the side frame outer and the center pillar reinforce are welded, and after the foam filling material is set in the space between the center pillar reinforce and the center pillar inner, the center pillar reinforce and the center pillar inner are welded. Thus, this structure requires at least two or more workings for setting the foam filling material in the interior spaces of the hollow structure, making the assembling work cumbersome and complicated.